Dry masonry



-Oct. 13, 1936. E. HQNI MANN ET AL DRY MASONRY Filed Oct. 26, 1935 IIIII. a111,!

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' INVENTORSI ERICH HONIGMANN FRIEDRICH BRUQKMAYER 7 AT'TORNEVLS' Patented Oct. 13, 1936 PATENT OFFICE nay MASONRY Erich Honigmann and Friedrich Bruckmayer, Vienna, Austria, assignors to Alexander Singer,

Vienna, Austria Application October 26, 1935, Serial No. 46,840

In Austria November 1'1, 1933 8 Claims. (01. 72-37) This invention relates to dry masonry and to a practical method of building such masonry.

The main object of our invention is to make it possible to lay up courses or tiers of bricks and 5 thereby construct masonry in dry form. without using the usual mortar and thereby obtain a masonry structure which has, as a result, a very high compressive strength and satisfactory resistance to shearing and bending.

10 Another object is to produce dry masonry which is time and labor saving without sacrificing any of the advantageous characteristics desired in a good structure of this nature.

A very important object of the invention is 15 to introduce between the tiers of thebricks mainly composing the masonry an intermediate joint material having considerably greater tensile strength and elasticity than the mortar which is ordinarily used in this art.

20 A further object is to utilize' the intermediate joint material between the bricks in the form of webs, bands or slabs. 1

Yet another object is to use petrified wood wool, special webs of the same or of other mate- 25 rial for the mentioned intermediate joint material. a

Other objects and the various advantages inherent in the nature and practice of our invention will appear more fully indetail as this specification proceeds.

In order to render our invention readily comprehensible and assist in pointing its advantages, reference is now had to the accompanying drawing forming part hereof, in which 35 Fig. 1 illustrates a piece of masonry constructed according tn the invention and embodying certain of its advantageous features.-

Fig. 2 is a vertical section of the masonry shown in Fig. ,1. r 40 Figs. 3 and '4 are similar sections illustrating modifications.

Fig. 5 is an elevation of a modified masonry structure ofcompressed type.

Fig. 6 is a, vertical section of the same. 45 Fig. '7 is an elevation of another modified masonry structure using surface plates;

Fig. 8 is a vertical section of the same.

Throughout the views, the same reference indicia refer't'o the same or like parts.

50 In ordinary masonry wherein mortar is used, it is well known that large quantities of water are unavoidably introduced into the structure during building, necessitating considerable loss of time for drying out the walls involved. It is 55 also well known that building operations are suspended altogether during frost and, practically the entire winter season, due to the impossibility of mixing and working mortar at low temperatures, Many other disadvantages might be added. 5

However, in order to eliminate all such disadvantages, and particularly with the foregoing objects in view, it is now proposed to depart entirely from the usual practice of laying mortar between the bricks in masonry. 10

Hence, in the investigations leading up to our invention, we have found that the material introduced between the bricks or blocks in masonry structures should be capable of yielding slightly, in order to allow for the "inequalities of the individual blocks, and on the other hand is of suflicient strength in the plane of the slab to withstand without breaking the strains set up in the material of the bed joints when stressed in compression. Tests carried out have unexpectedly shown, that masonry constructed in this manner ofiers to thrusts and shearing forces not only an equal, but mostly a greaterresistance than ordinary mortar masonry.

In the practice of this invention, it is particularly to be borne in mind that felt is not used as it is considered to be unsuited for the present purpose inasmuchas it is rather compressible and does not have tensile strength, firmness or resistance to shearing in, any marked degree, and we now depart herein from materials of that specific class.

However, investigation has shown that some materials of the fibrous nature are eminently suited to the purposes of the invention and have exhibited very satisfactory results. Thus we have found that among other materials available upon the, market, wood wool treated with petrifying or mineralizing substances will serve admirably and give excellent results. When using 4 such mineralized wood wool in the form of slabs or other suitable materials in useful form, the great advantage obtained is that the joint material can :be readily adapted to special requirements for insulating against cold, heat, sound, moisture, vibrations and the like.

In certain circumstances it may be desirable to provide the edges of the wood wool slabs with projecting thickenings. These provide the advantage, that when the courses are being laid,

the blocks are automatically brought into the correct position. If the wall is to'be subsequently plastered, these projections offer a good hold for the plaster material; they may also be used for fixing facing plates, whereby a sound and heat architectural effect for a raw brick building is obtained.

The wall is given additional strength, if the courses of blocks be provided with vertically in-.

serted. and firmly interconnected reinforcing or locking members. In combination with the above described invention they provide special advantages, however, which are due to the fact that the joint material used in accordance with the invention always retains a certain elasticity, so that, in contradistinction to their use with nonelastic blocks and mortars, the state of compression in the masonry produced in clamping the reinforcing members, or the tension in the locking members is always maintained. Furthermore these locking members prevent an outward buckling of the slabs in parts of the masonry which are stressed in bending at right-angles to the wall surface, thus increasing the bending strength of the masonry.

I Bearing the foregoing particulars in mind, we refer again moreparticularly to the drawing il-' lustrating the invention,

The fragmentary elevation of Fig. 1 illustrates the typical appearance of a piece of masonry constructed according to the invention. Hence, between each two courses of the bricks a is interposed the novel joint material b (for instance mineralized wood wool slabs). The vertical joints of the bricks at 0 may, but need not necessarily be filled with wood wool slabs, slag wool pads or the like.

In Fig. 2 is shown a piece of masonry in section,.

having plaster (1 applied upon one side on the slightly projecting edges of the joint material b and on the other side a covering plate 6 which is nailed to the joint material and supports the plaster d.

, Another typical application of the invention is illustrated in Fig. 3, which shows a construction in which the slabs of joint material b have thickened parts I at the edges serving on one side to support the plaster d and on the other side are covered with plates 9 in such a manner that an insulating air space it is formed between the covering plates and the masonry.

In Fig. 4 is shown a piece of masonry in section having the slabs of joint material b provided with metal framing i or pointed with decorative cement k.

The modified form of masonry construction shown'in Fig. 5 illustrates how several courses of bricks a are pressed together by locking members I with interposed joint material b. The locking members I are anchored in a concrete grid m on iron rails n.

In the detail modiilcationof the construction shown in Fig. 6. the locking members I are anchored in the concrete grid m on iron girders n.

The modified-masonry construction appearing in Fig. '7 illustrates how in this form of the invention, the anchoring means 0 of the covering plates p form the vertical locking members.

In Fig. 8 which shows a piece of masonry in section according to a further modification illus-.

trating the anchoring means 0 of the covering plates 71.

preferred joint material is mainly composed of mineralized wood wool or slag wool, but in order to bind the same into preferred form of slabs or pads, known binders may be used which tend to harden or set for the purpose of retaining the fibres in their position in the slab. The resulting surface of the slab is preferably rough and therefore presents a very highly satisfactory degree of friction with bricks which are laid up in contact therewith.

While it has heretofore been the practice to fill the joints between bricks withmortar usually prepared with lime, or similar binders andmixed with water, yet obviously this is wholly done away with when a wall does not have any mortar introduced into it but'each course or tier of bricks is simply overlaid with a slab or pad of the present novel joint material and subsequent courses laid upon the same and the operation repeated. It is also obvious that the temperature or season of the year will not affect the wall thus built and work may proceed rapidly.

Nevertheless, webs .of woven material such as jute or slabs of fibrous material reinforced with wires or wire mesh or netting will also give good results, so that these materials may be used instead of the mineralized woodwool.

In addition to the foregoing, it should be pointed out that while apparently it is not new to resort to the use of other filling materials than mortar, it has hitherto been completely overlooked that the important feature which must be present is that great tensile strength and elasticity of the joint material introduced are essential in order to impart to the masonry such strength as to equal the best mortared masonry when the proper selection of materials has been made. The surprising discovery has also been made that when materials having these characteristics and, in addition, having very high degree of friction with the surface of the bricks, the resulting structure will present an astonishingly high resistance to buckling or bending.

While the invention has for the most part been described as used in connection with bricks or blocks, it is obvious that in the appended claims bricks are equivalent to building stones, concrete blocks or other well known forms of building units used for constructing walls and masonry in general. Manifestly, further modifications and varimediate joint means interposed between said courses, said joint means comprising inherently firm joint material consisting of vegetable fibres associated with a setting binder retaining said fibres structurally in position, the fibres and binder together serving to hold the bricks in association by, friction and having great tensile strength, resistance to shearing and a general roughness imparting great compressive strength to the masonry.

2. Dry masonry according to claim 1, wherein the joint material is formed into slabs provided with wire reinforcing insertions.

3. Dry masonry according to claim 1, wherein the vegetable fibres in the joint material con- .sist of wood wool, and joint material is formed ,into slabs provided with wire reinforcing insertions.

4. Dry masonry according to claim 1, wherein 76 the fibres in the joint material consist 01' mineralized wood wool, and the joint material is formed into flat slabs.

5. Dry masonry according to claim 1, wherein the joint material projects exteriorly of the masonry between the courses in the i'orm of thickened portions.

6. Dry masonry according to claim 1, wherein the joint material projects exterlorly of the masonry between the courses in thetorm 0! thickened portions upon one side and a decorative facing is applied to the joint material on the other side of said masonry. I

7. Dry masonry according to claim 1. wherein the joint material consists of a woven web or vegetable fibres reinforced with wire reinforcing insertions.

8. Dry masonry according to claim 1, wherein a plurality of elongated reinforcing and locking members are built into the masonry structure, each oi said reinforcing and locking members extending past a plurality of the individual bricks in said structure and serving to lock the same into a dry masonry structure under a pre- 10 determined constant degree of compression.

ERICH HON'IGMANN. FRIEDR. BRUCKMAYER. 

